


it's you and i in all the faces of trouble

by independentalto



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: F/M, canon up until the end of s3, plus lil ellie!, the rest of the team shows up briefly but that's not for a while
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-25
Updated: 2020-07-25
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:13:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25509565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/independentalto/pseuds/independentalto
Summary: After being disowned from SHIELD, Bobbi and Hunter do their best to move on, live life and ultimately forget their relationship with the only family they've ever known.Fate, unfortunately, has other plans.
Relationships: Lance Hunter/Bobbi Morse
Comments: 12
Kudos: 38





	it's you and i in all the faces of trouble

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ClementineWhy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ClementineWhy/gifts).



> written for @clementinewhy on tumblr, who asked for the prompt "I'm not mad. honest" and huntingbird. thanks so much -- I had a ton of fun with this lil family!

“Ellie, honey, we’re going to be late for school!” 

Early morning was just streaming into the Hunter-Morse household, sunlight sprawling over their wood-finished kitchen island and just slanting over the twin cups of coffee that sat on it. Three boxed lunches sat to their right, each of them filled with a variety of sandwiches, snacks and fruit before they were zipped up with swift hands. “Hunter, I swear if you don’t get down here I’m giving your beer to the high school kids down the street.” 

“There is  _ no  _ need for slander, Bob!” A few harried stumbles down the step later, Hunter was in the kitchen, fingers fumbling to perfect his tie. “One, that’s the  _ last  _ of the booze I had imported, giving it away would be sacrilege, and two, last I checked we were still in the States, so giving it away to the high school kids would be illegal.” He sighed when Bobbi fixed his tie without fuss, leaning in to give her a quick peck on the lips. “Where’s the bird? Shouldn’t be down here by now?” 

“Ta-da!” As if summoned, Ellie Isabelle Morse made her debut in the kitchen, skidding across its polished hardwood floors before coming to a skilled, short stop in front of her parents. (It was a little  _ too  _ skilled of a stop if you asked her, Bobbi mused, probably due to the fact that Hunter was probably teaching her to slide while she wasn’t looking. Traitor.) “I’m ready!” 

Ready in five-year-old meant throwing on every layer of clothing one had in their closet and then some. Even the tutu Ellie’d sported last Halloween was making an appearance this morning, slipped precariously over both a pair of jeans and the knee-length skirt she was also wearing. Rounding out the outfit was one of Bobbi’s old Star Wars t-shirts tucked into all three bottoms and Hunter’s cowboy boots, which did Ellie a disservice as they practically went up to her knees. 

Hunter, sensing his wife was about three seconds away from wanting to pull out a bottle of Chardonnay, gently let out a slow whistle while bending to Ellie’s height. “I think it looks fabulous, love,” he said, tapping her gently on the cheek. “But you know, if you have pants  _ and  _ a skirt  _ and  _ a tutu, you’re not gonna be able to run the best at recess. Slows you down, you know?” She nodded, eyes wide. “Plus, it’s hot out. You don’t wanna run around in all three of those, don’t you? You’re gonna get all sweaty, ick!” He made a show of wiping off his forehead. “Why don’t you go pick a pair of shorts instead? It’ll make you a lot faster, and you won’t sweat.” 

Ellie tugged at her shirt, looking up at him with doleful eyes. “Can I still wear mommy’s shirt?” 

“I don’t see why not,” he chuckled, and Ellie’s eyes lit up. “Now go on then, I’ll see you in a minute.” Buoyed by the prospect of getting to carry her mother with her to school, Ellie instantly scampered back up the stairs to her room, and the sounds of her rummaging through her closet could be heard as Hunter got back to his feet. “Thought that shirt’d gotten lost,” he hummed, sipping at one of the coffee cups sitting on the island. “Turns out our daughter’s closet is the place where lost things go.” 

Bobbi snorted, though not unkindly. “Or the place you stash things so you can tell me you’ve finally thrown them out.” Honestly, she was surprised the boots were still kicking – through hastily packed bunks and several safe house moves, she would’ve expected them to have gotten lost somewhere. But alas, she’d forever be reminded of Hunter’s Texas accent…

“You know you like them.” Hunter finished the rest of his coffee just as Ellie came rocketing back down the stairs, her outfit this time thankfully much less cluttered in a pair of black shorts and Bobbi’s t-shirt tucked into it. “Looks good, El.” The two of them exchanged high-fives before Hunter grabbed his lunchbox, leaning first to give Bobbi a peck on the lips (“Gross!” exclaimed Ellie) before doing the same to kiss Ellie’s head as she climbed onto her chair at the kitchen island. “Bye, birdie. Bye, birdie number two.” 

“Mmmph!” Ellie called, her mouth full of eggs as their front door shut. 

A comfortable silence filled the kitchen while Bobbi finished up the rest of the morning dishes, sipping idly at her coffee while perusing the headlines on her phone. The local high school students were ingesting poppy seeds for an opium high – perhaps it was better she didn’t give them Hunter’s beer – construction on the new subway expansion was extended another month, trash days were switching  _ again… _ “Ready to go, birdie?” she asked when a lack of clinking silverware came from Ellie’s side of the island. A nod. “Y’know, I really like your shirt today,” she chuckled, grabbing Ellie’s backpack and holding it out for her. “Where on Earth did you get it?” 

“’S okay that I wear it, right?” Ellie asked again. “Daddy said it was okay. N’ it looks cool.” The reaffirmation made Bobbi smile through filling her thermos – Ellie was truly her child. 

“Of course,” she answered, and grabbed her keys while her daughter raced to put on her shoes. “Remind me to make it Ellie-sized when you get home today, though. I think it’s just a  _ little _ too big for you.”

* * *

The drive to school was uneventful – Ellie chattered most of the way about the epic game of tag she’d been scheduling with her entire first-grade class for most of the week, her demonstrations of its epicness evident in the sweeping gestures she used to explain it. She, unfortunately, ran out of time to explain the penalty box system by the time Bobbi pulled up, but it was with the same enthusiasm that she bounced up the long walkway to the school’s entrance, departing her with a quick “Bye mommy!” upon seeing her friends. 

Bobbi lingered for a moment after Ellie ran off, taking in the multitudes of children gathering in various cliques around her. If you’d asked her five or six years ago whether she’d seen this in the future, she probably would’ve laughed their face before asking them what they were on. Raising a child (with Hunter, no less) had been the last thing on her mind. Raising a child in  _ suburbia _ hadn’t even been a thought she’d considered entertaining. 

But against all odds, that’d been exactly what their life was – and it was on days like this she could almost forget that the watchful eye of the federal government was constantly trained on them, simply waiting for them to make the slightest of slip-ups so that they could take everything they’d built away. Bobbi sighed when the bell rang, taking it as her cue to slip on her shades and head back to the car. Traffic wouldn’t be too bad on the way to work, she figured. She might even have time to stop by that bakery on Myrtle on her way into the city. 

_ “Did you see what Morse dressed her daughter in today?”  _

_ “It’s like she’s not even wearing pants. Honestly, are she and her husband even  _ trying  _ to raise that child right?”  _

A barely-hidden snort.  _ “What, you really think that’s her husband? Everyone knows he’s just the boytoy. The real question is when he’s going to get fed up with her and leave.” _

__ Even under her shades, Bobbi’s gaze hardened.  _ God,  _ she hated suburban moms. “Love your blouse today, Sharon,” she called, and the women who’d been conversing behind her looked up in alarm. “Whose reject pile did you steal it out of this week?” 

“Bobbi,” Sharon stuttered, looking for all the world as if she’d just been caught with her hand in a proverbial cookie jar. “I, um, you weren’t meant to hear that, we didn’t mean to be so --” 

“Callous? Demeaning? Bitchy?” Bobbi raised her shades over her forehead and shot them her most withering glare. “I’m  _ sure _ you didn’t mean to be speaking so loudly, but you know what they say about the two-buck chuck: it helps you get loud.” Eyes widening ever-so-slightly in innocence, she brought her coffee to her lips and took a casual sip. “Little  _ early  _ to be getting into it, though, isn’t it?” 

“Bold of you to assume that we’re --” 

“Oh, my mistake,” Bobbi drawled. Growing up in cotillion central did have its perks sometimes, and sometimes those perks meant having mastered the art of packing condescension into the smallest of sentences. “Obviously you’re well deep into it, and I just couldn’t tell. Make sure you clear the school zone before you open the second bottle, I hear there’s patrol. Oh, and Gayle.” The woman who’d been conversing with Sharon looked up with a squeak, and Bobbi shot her the most indecent wink she could muster. “My husband’s doing just fine acting as a boytoy, if you know what I mean. Give me a call if you ever want to come...watch.” Not that she’d ever _ let _ her, but sometimes it was the principle of the zinger, not whether she meant them. 

“I – I would _ never -- _ ” Both Gayle and Sharon were gathering fair amounts of redness in their cheeks, and Bobbi checked her phone, sighing. So much for the bakery. 

“If you’ll excuse me.” Still smirking, she swung back into her car and pulled out of the lot, her sense of satisfaction sitting content on her shoulders all the way onto the highway. 

She’d faced down power-hungry traitors, Inhumans and the Russian government. She’d nearly lost a lung, for god’s sakes. A couple of suburban mothers was practically child’s play.

* * *

“You should probably let me drop El off tomorrow, love. I think you’re scaring the other parents again.”

“But Sharon’s so  _ mean _ , Hunter,” Bobbi whined, for all the world sounding like a teenager rather than a fully-grown ex-SHIELD agent. The two of them were cuddled deep into the couch at the end of yet another day, Ellie having been tucked into bed some time ago with promises of ice cream and more of her parents’ shirts. (They weren’t quite sure what her attachment to them was, but they had to admit it was fun to see her dressed as a younger version of themselves.) “Yesterday when I dropped Ellie off, she looked at me and said ‘Must’ve been a hard night yesterday with the two-buck chuck’. I don’t buy two-buck chuck anymore. My chuck’s worth at least seven!” 

Sure, Sharon was mean. But it meant Bobbi got to stress her verbal sparring skills now and again, and if she couldn’t physically spar the suburban mothers of the neighborhood, she’d settle for verbally doing so. 

“No one’s saying you’ve got shit taste in wine, love.” He certainly wasn’t – the pink Moscato she’d bought during their last liquor run had gone down like juice. “I’m just saying maybe try being a little nicer to the mums ‘round here. Some of their kids are Ellie’s friends.” 

Bobbi snorted. “If I find out that any of her friends are associated with those fake tan gossips, I’m asking the agent watching us to get them arrested.” 

“Bob.” The word was laced with warning. “What did we say about using the agent watching us for your agenda?” 

She sighed. She loved Hunter, but he really took the fun out of things sometimes. “Not to use it unless it was a matter of life or death.” She shot him her most doe-eyed look, the one she usually reserved for extra snack purchases and five more minutes of morning cuddles. “Public intoxication?” 

“No.” 

“Public nuisance?” 

“No, love.” 

“Open container laws?” 

“Bobbi.” 

“Aw, come on!” Maybe they would get another divorce. At least it would allow her to sling insults to her heart’s content. “I hate that we’re law-abiding citizens sometimes.”

Hunter chuckled, pulling her close. “I know,” he murmured, and pressed a soft kiss to the top of her head. “The things we do for Ellie.” 

“The things we do,” Bobbi agreed, and they watched TV for a few minutes in silence before she spoke again. “Do you miss it?” 

“Do I miss what?” 

“SHIELD,” she said, and it was Hunter’s turn to snort. “Not  _ SHIELD  _ SHIELD. But what we had there. You know. Breakfasts with FitzSimmons and Daisy. Watching Coulson and May pretend they’re not in love with each other. Losing to  _ Call of Duty  _ with Mack and Lincoln. That stuff.” Sometimes, when the air in their bedroom was a little  _ too  _ still, Bobbi would reminisce on the days they’d been a part of the ragtag organization. There was a lot she didn’t miss – getting shot at, constant medical visits, the weight of the world on her shoulders  _ all the damn time.  _

But other than the occasional acquaintance at work, there was no one she really spoke to but Hunter, and the lack of camaraderie got to her sometimes. She missed being able to cotton on to Jemma’s theories in the lab or sparring with May to get her strength back up. Was being a parent usually this isolating? 

“I miss the team, yeah,” Hunter answered, and the reminder of what they’d lost panged in both of their chests, a small but never-forgotten hole in their hearts. “I miss bickerin’ with Fitz over football and beers with Mack. And I miss snarking with Daisy and May. But none of that’s here and now,” he shrugged, and oh, Bobbi could kiss him. “We’ll get back to them someday. I’m not worried about that. Some day when we’re all old and retired and not deemed a threat anymore. But for right now, I’ve got the woman I love and a little bird in the nest upstairs.” He leaned down to kiss her, a soft declaration of contentment. “‘S all I need.”

* * *

Sometimes, there were days Bobbi wondered how Hunter had gotten his driver’s license at all.

“You can unclench now, love,” he said cheerfully as their SUV screeched up in front of a nondescript house. Bobbi, who’d taken up a death grip on the handle above the passenger side door, slowly forced each of her fingers to uncurl from it. (If she was trying to get her stomach to unclench too, well, no one had to know.) “What? We made it in one piece, didn’t we?” 

She exhaled. “We almost didn’t when you decided to pass that minivan on a  _ double yellow _ .” If she’d thought she’d seen her life flash before her eyes during her time as an agent, Hunter’s suburban driving put all of those to shame. She could just see the gossip among the elementary moms now – the two of them in a grisly accident after passing a minivan on their way to pick up Ellie from a playdate. They’d have a fucking  _ field  _ day. 

“He was doing forty in a forty-five zone, Bob,” Hunter complained as they got out of the car. “You can’t tell me you wouldn’t have done the same if you were me.” The excited babble of children grew increasingly louder as they crossed the lawn and to the backyard, and Bobbi was about to swing open the wooden gate when a flash of movement caught her eye. 

“You go ahead,” she said evenly when Hunter gave her a concerned look. “I – I don’t  _ think  _ it’s anything, but I want to check to make sure.” He nodded and entered the backyard while Bobbi looked around furtively before crouching to look through a poorly-screened window at the junction of the ground and the house’s exterior. 

The lack of light made it difficult to see what was going on inside, but once Bobbi’s vision adjusted a little more, she was just barely able to make out the outlines of a few bodies in the basement. The basement itself was sparsely furnished, a few chairs against a wall and a bookshelf in the far corner. One of the big kickers, however, was the overhead lamp lighting a sterile table in the middle of the room – the sterile table that currently had a quivering mass lying in a pool of blood.  _ Well, shit. _

“What’cha lookin’ at, mommy?”

Bobbi jerked at the sound, looking back to see an inquisitive Ellie looking at her with wide blue eyes. Right. The playdate. “Hey, birdie,” she said, hoping her voice wouldn’t give away the horrors of what she’d just seen. “How was the playdate?” And that was another thing – both she and Hunter had run a thorough-as-possible check on Ellie’s friend Carl – how had they missed this glaring detail about his family? Were they finally slipping? 

“Goody!” Ellie chirped, and Hunter shot her a concerned look while the two of them led her to the car.  _ Later,  _ Bobbi mouthed, and such was her distress over the idea that they’d possibly put their daughter’s life in jeopardy that she got into the passenger seat without complaint. “Carl’s mommy gave us Pops’cles and let us jump on the trampoline outside, and I met his dog Mr Cuddles...” 

Hunter didn’t bring up the topic again until later that night, after all the dishes had been dried and Ellie snoozing away in her bird’s nest (he’d taken the bird theme quite seriously). “Did you see something today?” he asked, voice oddly muted in the crisp stiffness of their AC-provided air. “When we were picking up Ellie.” 

“There was a basement.” Bobbi’s next sigh rattled through each of her bones, the lingering familiarity of dealing with unknown adversaries settling back into her soul as if it’d never left. “And I don’t know what was  _ in  _ the basement, but I’m pretty sure I saw a body, Hunter. Multiple bodies. And blood. It was a goddamned  _ surgery  _ table,” she said, and Hunter squeezed her hand gently. “I – we can’t just ignore that there was probably a  _ body  _ in that basement.” 

“But we don’t necessarily have the backup or power to find that out,” he countered, both as a reminder and an agreement. “We’re not SHIELD anymore, Bob. This isn’t our job. We don’t have to go sprinting face-first into the first suspicious thing we see. That’s not who we are anymore.” 

“But is it still our duty to?” she asked, and both of them fell silent at that. Technically, they owed nothing to SHIELD, having been disowned by the agency long ago. And should they become tangled in a SHIELD-level mess, there would be nothing to protect them from retribution if they got in way over their heads. This wasn’t Russia – there would be no Coulson with an EMP to save them this time, and if they failed, they would lose a lot more than the roof over their heads. 

Maybe it was all the years Bobbi’d spent with SHIELD, or maybe it was the fact that they’d been reminiscing over their time with the team just the other night, but something in her pulled to investigate for the greater good. To do her team one last favor, be it though five years late. Yet the truth of the matter was that her responsibilities lay elsewhere now – and that was something she needed to remember.

“It’s not just us anymore,” Hunter reminded her softly, and already, guilt was squeezing into her chest for even  _ considering  _ putting herself in danger for a shake at her glory days. “I know the mums are getting to you, love. But you’ve always been your own force. Just because you’re not physically fighting a battle doesn’t mean you’re not winning anything at all, I promise.” 

She  _ was  _ a boss-ass bitch. She knew that, and she didn’t need to get bloodied and bruised for it. Someone else would take care of the secret underground lab, surely. Nothing like that would ever go unnoticed for long. 

So why couldn’t she shake the idea that something was going to go completely, horribly wrong?

* * *

For a man supposedly in charge, Coulson mused, confusion seemed to be on Jeffery Mace’s face a lot. “Did I ever look that confused as Director?” he whispered to May, who tilted her head in a deadpan as a response. “Mm. Noted.” He still wasn’t sure why the two of them had specifically been called into Mace’s office, but he had a feeling it had something to do with the current expression on his face. 

“HYDRA?” Mace asked, still staring puzzledly at the brief on his desk. May had placed it on his desk some minutes earlier – suspicious activity in the suburbs of Arlington, Virginia that seemed too similar to HYDRA to not be a coincidence. “What do you mean there’s a resurgence in the country? I thought SHIELD and Steve Rogers wiped out the whole of it when the Triskelion back in 2014.” 

“Cut one off and two more will take its place” was all May and Coulson deadpanned in eerie synchronization. They hadn’t even meant to do it – it was just that they’d heard the sentiment so often it was almost instinct to respond that way. 

Mace stared at both of them for a long moment, thoroughly unnerved by their proclamation. “Well,” he began, trying to regain a sense of stability in his voice, “seeing as HYDRA is still very much an organization SHIELD would like to keep under wraps – we’ve already got enough on our plates as is – we’ll have to get this contained as soon as possible. May, can I trust you to take a team and get this sorted out?” 

“I’ll take Mack, Coulson and Johnson,” May said immediately. 

Mace frowned. Daisy Johnson had just come in from her latest mission a little more banged-up and bruised than expected, and he would rather not send her out again so quickly, especially on a mission that might turn out to be trite. “Johnson isn’t cleared for --” 

“I take Johnson or HYDRA becomes public knowledge.” It was a bold move and the three of them knew it, but when Melinda May picked a team, she got that team – there was no one better suited to the job than she was and Mace knew it. What confused Coulson, though, was  _ why  _ May’d chosen to force the ultimatum. Did she know something he didn’t? 

After a long moment, Mace nodded, and May turned to Coulson. “Wheels up in forty. I’m going to get Daisy.” 

“Why did you --” he began, but her stony look screamed ‘Not here”, so he waited until all four of them were safely aboard the Quinjet, she settled into the pilot’s chair and him in the one beside her. “Why the ultimatum, May?” he asked, the question almost lost to the Quinjet slicing through the air. “We could’ve taken Elena. Or Joey. Or any of the new Inhumans.” 

“I’ve got a feeling,” was all May said, gripping the wheel with white knuckles. “You’re gonna have to trust me on this, Phil. More than you usually do.”

* * *

Bobbi, Hunter and Ellie were just about to pull away from yet another playdate with Carl when rapid-fire gunshots erupted from the backyard, startling Ellie practically to tears. “W-wh-what was that?” she asked, and Bobbi’s heart broke at the fear that’d invaded her daughter’s voice. She’d hoped Ellie would never have to hear the sound of gunshots in real life – it was something that haunted both hers and Hunter’s dreams at night, and it hurt to think that it would now haunt Ellie’s. “Mommy? Daddy?” 

Hunter sighed when Bobbi glanced at him, knowing what was coming. “Bob, you can’t –“ 

“Hunter, there could be  _ people --”  _

_ “That’s not your job anymore.”  _

“I took an oath when I joined SHIELD --” 

“Yeah, well look where that bloody got us!” Hunter exploded, and only a whimper from the backseat reminded him of where they were. “You’re not SHIELD anymore, Bobbi, no matter how much you like to think you are,” he continued, lowering his voice so as to not shock Ellie any more than she already was. “This is our life now. And I know it’s not what you wanted. I know. It’s not what I wanted, either. But if you go in there and get hurt --” He pointed at Ellie, who was staring at the both of them with wide eyes. “How are you going to explain that to her? That there are bad people who want to hurt you because of the things you’ve done? Or that you’re gonna leave and get killed just for a chance at your glory days, huh? How are you going to explain that?” 

“I would  _ never _ ,” Bobbi hissed, and for a minute, it was like they’d never left SHIELD, both of them staring each other down with bitterness and resentment and pure  _ exhaustion  _ swimming in their eyes. Sure, they’d spent a somewhat idyllic five years in their little suburban bubble raising Ellie and doing their best to cement themselves, but the stress of one wrong move had never really left them. It’d shown itself in the most unexpected of clashes, and usually, they were solvable with a good night’s sleep and long discussion, but now, in the middle of an increasingly hostile situation, there was no time for either of those. So back to their old fighting style it was. 

“You say that, yet you just said you were going to go headfirst into a gunfight without anything on you whatsoever, real hypocritical, Bob, don’t know what else I expected from you --” Hunter was cut off by the sound of a small explosion and the screech of another set of wheels pulling up behind them. “See, someone  _ else  _ is going to take care of the problem, yeah? Told you you didn’t have to do the idiotic thing --” 

Bobbi blindly smacked at his face to shut him up, peering past a cowering Ellie and out the back window. “Hunter, it’s SHIELD.” 

“Don’t be daft, Bob, I’m sure it’s not --” Both of them fell silent as the whistle of crafted vibrations sailed through the air, followed by the unmistakable sound of a body colliding with something solid. “It’s SHIELD, isn’t it?” A knock on the driver’s side window caught their attention, and they turned to see a stoic-looking Mack standing by their tinted window, the air of professionalism in his features a welcome sight. 

“I’m going to have to ask you to vacate the area, this is now a SHIELD-sanctioned crime scene – Bobbi,” In an instant, Mack’s face dropped from authoritative to gobsmacked, his jaw dropping open at the sight of both of them. “Hunter.” Of all the ways she’d imagined they would all meet again, at the scene of a suburban fight was not one of them. “Wha…how?” 

Another explosion. “May and Coulson are back on the Quinjet, Mack, we gotta go!” Daisy yelled as she jogged by him. “Hey, Bobbi, hey Hunter!” She screeched to a stop as the cogs in her head finally caught up with what she’d just said, turning back. “What the fu --” 

“Language!” The word erupted from both Bobbi and Hunter’s mouths at the same time, an almost-reflex built from their years of self-monitoring. Frowns creased Mack’s and Daisy’s foreheads, both of them confused as to why two people they knew to be regular profanity users were suddenly regulating their language. Had their time on the run changed them that much? 

_ BOOM.  _ “Both of you, get in!” Hunter exclaimed, and Mack wasted no time wrenching the door open and waving Daisy in before clambering in himself. No sooner did the door click shut than Bobbi slammed on the gas, the car practically lurching to speed out of the neighborhood. 

It wasn’t until they were on the highway, safely far away from the site of the explosion, that Mack decided to address the elephant in the car. “So...a kid?”

* * *

“Mommy?” 

Several hours later, after a hasty pack up of the house (it was lucky they’d always decided to live somewhat spartanly) and a long debrief later, Bobbi and Ellie were seated on one of the beds in their bunk on the base. Ellie had been surprisingly cooperative throughout the whole process, and while Bobbi appreciated that now, she’d already made it her priority to sit her daughter down with someone so that she could fully process what’d just happened. Children, resilient as they were, didn’t just swallow down trauma and smile through the pain of it. 

“Yeah, El-bell?” Bobbi asked, gently combing through Ellie’s wet locks. She swallowed hard, not wanting to show the guilt that was threatening to swallow  _ her _ whole. If she hadn’t chosen that moment to pick a fight with Hunter, if they’d picked up Ellie five minutes later, if they’d dawdled for even another minute saying their goodbyes… “What’s up?” 

“You’re not mad at Daddy, are you?” Something akin to a sob clogged itself into Bobbi’s chest then, and she let out a choked laugh that had Ellie looking at her in concern. “’M serious, mommy,” she pouted, delivering said pout in such a Hunter-esque way Bobbi knew she would in major trouble when her daughter got older. “I don’ like when you ‘n Daddy get mad at each other.” 

“Oh, honey.” All of this, and Ellie was most concerned at whether she was mad at Hunter? Bobbi could hardly comprehend it, such was the guilt and relief consistently manifesting itself in her chest. What was it like to be a child again, she wondered, to be able to adapt to changes in the blink of an eye without verily missing the past? “I’m not mad. Honest,” she said when Ellie gave her a steely-eyed glare that had most  _ definitely  _ come from her. “I’m not mad at Daddy. He did a very good thing today because he got mad at me. I just didn’t see it at the time.” 

“Are you gonna leave like Daddy said you would?” 

“No, honey.” Bobbi pulled Ellie close, breathing in the scent of her shampoo and feeling tears prick at her eyes. This was her  _ daughter _ , her flesh and blood that she’d birthed entirely on her own and that was worth more than anything else in the world. How had she almost given all of it away? And for what could’ve been nothing? “I wouldn’t leave you and Daddy for anything in the world, I promise.” 

“Not even for a million chocolate chip pancakes?” 

Bobbi sniffled. “Not even for a million chocolate chip pancakes. Not even for those.” The door to their bunk slid open then, and Ellie left her arms for Hunter’s with an exultant ‘Daddy!’. It left the space in Bobbi’s lap cold and hollow, the emotions churning in her chest even more exposed to the elements; for a moment, it was if the superglue that’d been holding her together since the battle that afternoon would finally disintegrate, letting her crumble into pieces. 

“Hey, El,” Hunter chuckled, picking her up and swinging her around in circles. “You get a chance to get all cleaned up?” 

Ellie nodded. “Mommy showed me how big people shower,” she answered solemnly, and Bobbi smiled wanly at the memory of having to show her the sterile-looking shower stalls. “I didn’t use a rubber ducky at all!” 

“Well, that’s gonna change, I promise,” he told her, carrying them both back over to the bed and sitting next to Bobbi, who was still sitting, frozen. “Your aunt Daisy – she’s the one that made the cool shapes with the water,” he explained when Ellie looked confused, and she nodded. “Your aunt Daisy’s gonna help us get a new house not too far from here, and it’s gonna have a bathroom with a bathtub for  _ all  _ your rubber duckies,” he said, and Ellie gasped. 

“ _ All  _ of ‘em?” 

“All of them. But that’s not gonna be ‘till tomorrow, and for now, we gotta get some sleep so we can be bright and early for breakfast..” The young Hunter-Morse cast a long look towards the lone twin bed that’d been placed alongside Bobbi and Hunter’s king one before looking back towards him with a beseeching look in her eyes. 

“C’n I sleep with you ‘n mommy tonight?” 

Hunter’s expression softened, and he tucked a stray lock of hair behind Ellie’s ear before nodding. “Of course, El-bell,” he murmured. “Plenty of room in here for all three of us. C’mon, Bob, come to bed,” he called softly when Bobbi still didn’t move from her position. “We’ve got a long day tomorrow.” 

Almost automatically, Bobbi turned and shuffled under the sheets next to the two of them, reaching to click off the lamp hanging above their heads. “Good night, Ellie,” she whispered, kissing Ellie’s forehead. “G’night, Hunter.” Even in the dark, he could see the conflicts and arguments swimming behind the ocean that was Bobbi’s eyes, currents that crashed and tossed and turned without any end in sight. 

“Bob,” he whispered as soon as Ellie’s telltale snores began to fill the room. “Bob, talk to me, please.  _ Please _ .” They may have been back on the base, but the rules they’d made post-SHIELD still applied – she wouldn’t stonewall, and he would work on being less frustrated on the rare occasions she would. “I didn’t mean it when I said you were a hypocrite for almost going into the fight,” he said, and she blinked, two tears sliding down her cheeks. “You would give everything to come back to Ellie, I know. I’m sorry I said you wouldn’t.” 

“I  _ considered  _ it, Lance,” she whispered, and the utterance of his first name broke her whisper into a sob. “So much could’ve gone wrong this afternoon, and my first thought when I heard the gunshots wasn’t  _ we need to get Ellie out of here _ , it was  _ there’s probably people in there and I need to get them out _ . What kind of mother am I to put other people’s lives before my own daughter’s, Hunter?” she asked, and two desperate eyes glittered in the darkness while tears streamed down her cheeks. “You said it wasn’t my life anymore, and it’s not. And yet --” Bobbi took a deep, shuddering breath. “-- it was so  _ easy  _ to slip back into it. I  _ wanted  _ to slip back into it. Ellie doesn’t – she deserves better than that. She deserves better than me.” 

The silence lay between them for a long while, Bobbi struggling to straighten out the war currently being waged with herself while Hunter tried to process it all. “I’m not gonna say that you’re not that kind of person because we both know that’ll get us nowhere,” he finally said, and she turned to look at him blankly. “But I do think you should talk to someone about it. And not to me – but I’ll be here if you want to talk to me  _ after _ it,” he said quickly. “I know you. If you leave it be, it’ll eat you alive. It’s best to get it out while it’s still fresh.” More silence. “And you do deserve Ellie,” he murmured. “You’re her mother. She wouldn’t want anyone else.” 

Even more silence. “Hunter?” Bobbi asked finally.

“Yeah, Bob?” 

“I love you.” 

“I know.” Softly, so as to not disturb Ellie, Hunter leaned to kiss Bobbi on the forehead. “And I love you, too. Try to get some sleep, okay? Daisy’s going to murder us both if we’re useless tomorrow.” She nodded and curled an arm around Ellie, pulling her close as she did her best to shut her mind down for the night. 

The fight was long from over – and honestly, Bobbi mused as she turned slightly, there was a little bit of irony in the fact that they’d uprooted their lives yet  _ again  _ because of SHIELD. But things would be different this time, she hoped. 

This time, they wouldn’t be doing it alone. 

**Author's Note:**

> If there's a pairing you'd like to see, I'm taking requests from [this](https://justanalto.tumblr.com/post/622842304685834240/300-prompts) and [this](https://justanalto.tumblr.com/post/623191689172058112/send-me-a-ship-and-one-of-these-and-ill-write-a) list!


End file.
